Croswell to showcase camp favorite 'Rocky Horror'

Thursday

As Halloween approaches, it’s time once again to break out the fishnet stockings and do the “Time Warp” at the Croswell Opera House’s production of the camp classic “The Rocky Horror Show.”

The production opens at 8 pm. Friday, Oct. 19, with additional performances at 8 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 20; 3 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 21; 8 p.m. Friday, October 26; and midnight Saturday, Oct. 27. Tickets are $28 for adults and $25 for students and senior citizens, and may be ordered by calling 264-7469; at the box office, 129 E. Maumee St., Adrian, weekdays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.; or online at www.croswell.org.

Participation packs containing all the props needed for audience participation are available for $5. Adding to the participatory element, audience members are encouraged to come in costume, with Friday and Saturday night performances featuring a contest with prizes for the audience’s favorite costumes.

Due to its adult language and content, the show may not be suitable for all ages.

This will be the third time the Croswell has staged the cult-favorite musical. And, said Croswell Artistic Director Jere Righter, the theater plans to make the show an annual Halloween-time tradition; after producing the show two years in a row, the Croswell scheduled a different production last year — the new Michael and Betsy Lackey musical “Obsession” — and heard from many of the legion of “Rocky Horror” fans that they wanted their favorite show to return.

Why, exactly, is this twisted, campy musical, a sendup of the classic sci-fi movies of the 1950s, such a hit, either in live action or in its film version, “The Rocky Horror Picture Show”? And how did the now-legendary audience participation, which involves props and people showing up in costume and yelling things in reply to the onstage/onscreen action, get started?

Equity actor Eric Parker of Chicago, who once again directs the Croswell’s production in addition to reprising his role as Riff-Raff, is the first to say he really has no clue why it’s so popular.

“The original show (which was produced in London in 1973 and had a disastrous Broadway run soon thereafter) was so terrible,” he said.

“It’s the show I’ve done more than any other, and I still don’t get it. I still don’t know why it works. ... At some point, you give in to the stupidity.”

Of course, what really makes it work is that participatory factor, which Parker said apparently started with the movie version. It opened right after the poorly received Broadway production, “and it was so badly edited — probably intentionally so — that people started yelling back at the screen.”

And things just went from there, generally all in good fun but sometimes a bit less so. While the show does have its adult content — Parker calls it “a quaint naughtiness” — and language, “unfortunately, the worst ad libs (in terms of content) come from the audience now,” he said.

In addition to doing the Croswell versions, Parker has performed the show numerous times at the Barn Theater as well as at the Maryland Ensemble Theater. Besides playing Riff-Raff, he has experience as Rocky and Eddie as well as understudying the part of Dr. Frank-N-Furter.

“But Riff-Raff is the part I like the most, especially as a director,” he said. “He just lurks in the background and watches what’s going on.”

“They’re an enthusiastic group of weirdos,” Parker said, laughing. “I’m actually having more fun with them this time around.”

Manger, who was suggested for the part by the show’s choreographer, Stephanie Stephan, is stepping into the role played in both previous Croswell versions by Sean Catron, who died suddenly almost a year ago. Manger was last on the Croswell stage some 15 years ago in “1776” as Thomas Jefferson.

“I thought, ‘That’s perfect,’ ” Parker said. “It’s someone completely out of the blue, to remove some of the pall of losing Sean. And Paul is really good. ... (He) will bring a whole different element, a different energy, to Frank than Sean did.”

While making any show an annual event, as is planned for “Rocky Horror,” may seem to make it easier to produce, in reality that creates some challenges.

“It’s actually harder to do it over again,” said Parker, who has his own experience with the same concept through annual productions at the Barn Theater, “because there are expectations, especially when you want it to have a certain element of sameness. People like the tradition.”